Pokemon League Championship

This has been something I've always wanted to do in years of roleplaying but never really accomplished. I just want to gauge the interest of a tournament-stlye Pokemon League RP similar to the style of the anime. This role play, unlike others I'd like to start this one at the Pokemon League already- past the starting towns, past the badges, right Into the most intense action.

Because of the format, participants would obviously have some time between battles where they could spectate/develop relationships with others not battling. This might make the whole thing slow-moving, but relies on the people battling to advance. Severe inactivity would likely result in the other trainer winning and advancing though.

I'm thinking the "plot" will be pretty loose, defined by the characters and their motivations for competing. I am considering an overarching plot though that would only impact them all slightly throughout and only majorly at the end.

A few logistic things I'm still working out:

-A policy for deciding the victor of each battle. I want to find a good mix between game logic where types and strategy determine the outcome and anime logic where overcoming the odds is more possible than impossible. I think this is the big thing that hinders player vs. player centered Pokemon RP's so it needs to be ironed out. I would love to let it be left to the two participants and their writing and eventually deciding, but everyone wants their hero to win.

-A way to keep players knocked out of competition still involved. I'm thinking a double elimination format would be helpful if there's enough interest. Also, unless for some reason there is a HUGE amount of interest in this, all characters would have at least one battle against an "NPC" so they don't have to go in the first round unless they want to.

So, if there is some interest out there, I eagerly await your suggestions and opinions!

Mostly anything, really. It's on a case by case basis! Fantasy is a big one for me though.

Genre You DON'T Like:

I don't typically do Fandoms, that doesn't mean I won't, just that I don't have a lot of practice.

Well, I'm pretty interested, but I think I would need more detail on the fighting format and the tournament format before actually committing myself to this. I'm looking forward to more information in the future!

I'm always down for a pokemon-style role-play, I just never found someone set it up in such a way that it lasted very long. It sounds like you're aware of this though, and I hope you can beat the odds. I couple of suggestions to maybe make the life a bit longer/easier:
-Make sure there are some side activities for characters to do, such as safari, contests, pokeathlon, or anything else you might want to do
-Allow characters to engage in friendly battles outside of the tournament, something like practice matches in a 2v2 or 3v3 setting
-At some point(s) have a threat of some kind come in (A natural disaster, awakening ancient pokemon, team rocket[etc] or any combination of the three) which forces all the characters to work together to achieve victory. Cooperation like that goes a long way to fostering bonds and giving everyone something to do.
-Combine any/all of the above. Maybe while two characters are duking it out in the arena, the pokemon contest area is being attacked by team flare for beautiful pokemon and those who aren't in battle have to stop them

Just some suggestions. Definitely interested. One thing I would ask however: how would the pokemon mechanics work? They have different stats, but perhaps most importantly, how would moves work? Would it be the very strict 4 move only system, or would they be able to learn all the moves they know naturally with a restriction on TM's? Stuff like that opens up possibilities or forces people to think.

I was planning on the threats for sure. Theft, destructive Pokemon... The works.

I hadn't considered contests/safari... I think a "tournament Safari" would be a really neat idea, where trainers could go in and catch Pokemon to add to their teams. I'll probably compile a list of available Pokemon, certainly a larger list to prevent repeats, and then randomly draw one each round to decide a persons encounter should they choose to use it? Something like that could work.

I would like to expand from the 4 move set, just because if you get a really intense battle going and then suddenly the two people are just spamming the same move it's no fun to read. I'm thinking any move the Pokemon could know (moves learned by next evolutions can't be known yet) and give like a 2 TM exception or something. Maybe even less. It's somthing to experiment with for sure.

I'm thinking a 3v3 battle format, though I would let everyone pick up to 6 Pokemon to have with them, plus any in the box caught in the tournament safari they can keep in a box system.

I want to stay away from using something like Pokemon showdown for battles because that takes the creative aspect away. That's really the only thing I can't figure out, exactly how to do the battles. I'd hate to just say I will decide the winner as the GM because it really isn't fair.

When creating a team, have everyone put down their pokemon's stats on a simple 1-10 scale (maybe larger). Which is based largely on the pokemon's actual stats, but they have some input as to how they've trained them. For example:
-Metagross: HP 7/10, Attack 10/10, Defense 9/10, special attack 4/10, special defense 7/10, speed 2/10
-Sceptile: HP 5/10, Attack 7/10, defense 4/10, special attack 8/10, special defense 6/10, speed 10/10
-Lapras: HP 10/10, attack 4/10, defense 6/10, special attack 7/10, special defense 9/10, speed 4/10

During battle have each side state what their current pokemon will do, and assign a percentage chance of success based on stats, type, and creativity of the move (for example, typhlosion charges up a flame wheel and spins around the edge of the ring at an opposed steelix while said steelix attempts to use rock slide to halt its progress: Typhlosion is quite fast, and it is using a fire-type attack. However, steelix has extremely high defense, and rock type-moves are strong against fire, plus rock slide has a large area of effect. That combined with the fact that typhlosion only has an O.K. attack stat (as opposed to its special attack) and you'd probably give something like a 55% to 45% chance, favored by the typhlosion) When one side succeeds, they make an impact on the battle. Put a set number of how many impacts are needed to K.O. a pokemon (possibly based on HP, but you may just want to make it the same for everyone). As an ace in the hole, give every trainer the ability to push their pokemon so that they can "beat the odds" once during the course of the entire battle. Maybe give everyone's starter pokemon a use of this as well (one for the starter, one for the entire battle that can be used on any pokemon) so that if the trainer wants to do a particular risky move, they can pull it off.

That's a really interesting idea, and essentially the kind of thing I was leaning towards. The problem I have with it is even with the numbers there's really no concrete way to say what the percentage of success is. On top of that, If you have to pre-conceive each move every time and then the someone not involved in the battle has to calculate the percentage and see whether it hits or not and then relay that to the battlers, it might take a really long time to do just one battle.

Say you start the odds at 50% of successful hit for a regular attack. Then each advantage point you have as the attacker raises your odds by 10%. So in the example, the attacking pokemon has an 80% chance of successful hit. Random number generator is used, if it rolls 1-80 the attack is successful and you reduce the hitpoints total (# out of ten) by one. Maybe max out HP at 5 to prevent super long battles.

If you reverse it to say the attack is 4/10 and defense is 7/10, the advantage is -9. When defense is higher, the odds are reduced by 5% for every advantage point. Using our example, the odds are reduced from the initial 50% to 35%. That way if you have a pokemon with 1/10 attack against a pokemon with 10/10 defense, the odds are 5% rather than -90%.

Then when you have type advantages, if the attacking pokemon has the advantage your odds double. So say 5/10 attack fire vs 5/10 defense grass. 5-5=0, odds stays at 50%. Double the odds, thats a 100% success rate. If you end up with a success rate over 100%, say 150%, you will always hit once and have a 50% chance of hitting again, doing two hitpoints damage. This rightfully keeps type advantages pretty important.

If the attacking pokemon is using a grass type move vs a fire type, giving the defense the advantage, then you half the odds of success. So 7/10 attack grass vs 4/10 defense fire. 7-4=3, so 30+50= 80%. Type advantage goes to the defending pokemon, so half the odds to 40%.

Speed stat determines which pokemon moves first

I like the idea that you can slightly alter the base stats to show how you trained your pokemon. I think adding 1 or 2 in one stat is acceptable, but will have to reduce 1 or two from other stats to keep it equal.

keep your idea of the "beating the odds perk" which increases odds by X amount

moves like swords dance or harden can increase stats like they would in game and would always succeed, a limitation on stat boosts would possibly be set to +3 or something

For non-damaging moves like will-o-wisp, which burns the target, the same calculation is made without taking type into effect (unless the defending pokemon is unaffected, as in electric vs ground) and instead of removing HP the effect (burn in this example) is applied

What do you think about that kind of system? It's a bit complex but also seems fair. Priority moves like quick attack will need to be considered. Not sure if the priority effect would work.

I think the writers would set the scene, ending each post with their pokemon using a move. once both moves are called out, I would make calculations as the GM and determine hit/miss and all, report the results, and then the writers can continue the next move and then repeat. Since it's a turn-based game, it makes sense to translate into a turn-based Roleplay of sorts I guess. Same problem exists with taking a lot of time, but maybe that's just what it takes. I worry that the system will be too complicated for a group of people to wait through.

Wooh. That was a lot, and most of it was just me throwing ideas against the wall. Let me know if you think they'll stick. @Ixidor92

I like it, but there's one caveat. The primary reason I had the arbitrary percentages was to allow for creativity in writing, and also for speed to play a little bit of a larger role. You would expect something as fast as sceptile to be able to dodge several attacks for example, while something like Steelix really can only tank them. In the example you've given, all moves are pretty much assumed to hit, which by proxy makes durable pokemon more advantageous. The other part of course is to reward creativity. Since we aren't restricted to simply saying "use X move", we can give our pokemon more complex commands. For example, maybe using an attack like rock slide or ice beam to alter the terrain rather than directly attack the opponent. Maybe they attack in an unusual way, such as using dig and then attacking with something like take down or flare blitz from beneath. There's also the power of different move to take into account. Flamethrower is stronger than ember but weaker than fire blast for example.

I'll think some more on concrete details to maybe allow for such things, but I like where this creative train is going.

P.S. Do you want to include hold items at all, consumables, or just ignore items entirely?

Ah, yes, I thought about the power of moves but wasn't sure. There could be a ranking system, moves with power 10-50 are rank 1, 50-100 rank 2, 100+ rank 3? Something like that.

And yea, it is important to keep the creative aspect. Otherwise, we might as well be playing the game.

I was thinking ignoring hold items since it wouldn't make much logical sense from a writing standpoint. I think use items (potions, antidotes, etc) would be banned from the tournament but could be used as much as you wanted in outside activities. The only Item I would allow would be megastones, which could be worn by the pokemon like they are in the anime.

Mostly anything, really. It's on a case by case basis! Fantasy is a big one for me though.

Genre You DON'T Like:

I don't typically do Fandoms, that doesn't mean I won't, just that I don't have a lot of practice.

I would join in, but my thoughts tend to work themselves out in spoken conversation, which we can't have here. Not to mention this is my first attempt at anything even remotely similar, so I don't feel qualified to talk about the mechanics of it. I will definitely follow the discussion with interest though!

I haven't actually watched the anime since Hoenn, so my only experience with mega-stones is in-game. I would just as soon leave them out entirely, as it makes everything a little more complicated (and also pretty much necessitates everyone have at least one mega-evolution to be competitive)

How about this: For every point in speed that a pokemon has over their opponent, they add 3% to their chances whether attacking or defending? It could be higher, but that would quickly make speed the most important stat in the entire game. For example. Metagross has speed 2/10, sceptile has speed 10/10. sceptile therefore gets a 24% boost in its chances, which are otherwise pretty piss-poor (10/10 attack vs. 4/10 defense). In addition, anywhere from a 5% to 15% bonus may be given for creative writing or favorable circumstances in the battle. Still mulling over the power of moves however. There's also the accuracy to consider. Fire blast is more powerful than flamethrower, but flamethrower is more accurate. Should we perhaps work that into the system?

I had a thought: What if each rank of move gives a bonus to attack based on its strength? rank 1 moves give no bonus (they simply enable the attack), rank 2 moves give a +1, and rank 3 moves give a +2. We could maybe argue that the most powerful moves in the game (hyper beam, giga impact, hydro cannon, blast burn, frenzy plant, and maybe draco meteor) give a +3 bonus because of their side effects. The power is added to the appropriate attacking strength of the user (Hydro pump gives +2 to special attack, Leaf blade gives a +1 to attack). However, every move in the game (offensive or not) has a cool down based on it's pp in game. For example: Moves like ember and scratch can be used as often as the pokemon likes (anything with 30 pp+) Moves like bubble beam take 1 round of posting to recharge (between 30 and 15 pp) Moves like thunderbolt and flame-thrower take 2 rounds of posting to recharge. Attacks like fire blast and hydro pump take three rounds to recharge (5pp moves). This would also apply to defensive techniques like protect, light screen, iron defense, and calm mind.

This way more powerful moves are taken into account, but everyone won't just be spamming the strongest attacks. Also, it makes giving your pokemon some defensive moves more appealing. It also gives a route for attacks that affect pp. Spite, for example, could put an attack on cool down without it being used.

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